


these lonely years between you and me

by ruthlesslistener



Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Family Bonding, Father-Daughter Relationship, Gen, Hollow is here too and they are Tired, PK is trying to fix said child abuse, Past Child Abuse, Post-Canon, Prompt Fic, Prompt Fill, Reconciliation, Tumblr Prompt, embrace the void ending, he's arguably bad at it but like. he's trying man, hornet's not too receptive to it but only bc shes afraid of getting hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:28:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26310070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruthlesslistener/pseuds/ruthlesslistener
Summary: Requested by Vivifrage: Physical affection 21 with Hornet and PK? (Accidentally knocking your head into someone’s chin)Hornet did not mean to trip her estranged father's cuddling response while trapped on a field trip with him to the wastes. What was once a sleepless night for her alone soon evolves into an argument that neither combatant wants any part in, but cannot be helped when trapped in such close quarters, with so much dark history between them.It's a good thing that her half-sibling is such a light sleeper.
Comments: 23
Kudos: 121





	these lonely years between you and me

**Author's Note:**

> haha remember when the drabble requests were supposed to be only 200 words
> 
> yeah
> 
> But also in my defense the headcanon that wyrm cuddle instincts are tripped by bumping up under the jaw is super fuckin cute, and since cutesy shit and angsty shit go hand in hand with this family, it offered me just enough power to grab the bit between my teeth and run wild with it

Refuge in the wastelands was few and far between. 

Hornet had not expected to ever linger in the wild lands beyond Hallownest; even after she returned from Pharloom, the arduous journey had been taken through safe tunnels and passageways carved by thousands of years of dedicated traveling, taking great care to avoid the scouring winds of the wastes. The great plains of dusty white sands that her father spoke so scornfully of were not merely a tale told to keep bugs within the safety of Hallownest’s borders; the wild magic beyond was untamed and corrosive, eroding mind and memory until there was nothing left. The bugs and spiders she brought back from Pharloom had been terrified of it, and of Hallownest’s legend, even with experienced travelers in their midst. It had only been through her stubborn determination and lack of fear of godly carvershit that had allowed her to secure guides back to the fabled Hallownest, and even then the open expanses beyond the world had filled her with a terror and a longing that she had been too busy to deal with. Certainly, she never expected to be confronted with them again, especially once blighted Pharloom had caught wind of their trail. Hearing the Shade Lord’s welcoming roar had very thoroughly erased that peculiar wanderlust from her thoughts, doubly so when the mess Pharloom made had to be cleaned up, and the remaining inhabitants of Hallownest had to deal with the sudden influx of strangers into their midst. 

And yet here she was, crammed into a rocky nook in the mountains with the winds howling away outside, three full-blooded gods crammed in with her, til she swore that she couldn’t swing an arm without smacking Hollow in the face or elbowing Ghost in the neck. The Pale Wyrm had tried to keep his distance at first, mindful of her piercing glares, uncomfortable with Ghost’s flat stares, but even he had given up at some point, and had curled himself up as close to the entrance as he could when it was time to rest, where he had carved sigils of protection into the very air, blocking them all from the scouring sands blowing into the small cave. Even now, she could feel the soft, cool puffs of his breath against the back of her head, as strange and unwelcome as their owner. 

And nostalgic, in a way that she did not wish to admit to. The Lord of Shades-  _ Ghost,  _ that had been her sibling's folly- had been quite adamant in making sure he made amends. But a few month's worth of empty apologies and hearing him quietly weep in the dark hours of night did not bring back her mother, or quell the lonely longing aching in her chest from her first abandonment. Being so close to him now, when she re-established the distance he set, was...uncomfortable. To say the least. 

She shifted in the makeshift nest Hollow had raked up for them all, and sighed quietly.

Her father had called it a training exercise. A life lesson for newly-ascended gods, one that she had not managed to escape, despite her protests. Hollow’s sad stare had been too much for her, and if she did not go then Ghost would not go, either, and they were the one who benefited the most from such guidance, after years and years of neglect. Even she had to admit to that, and to concede defeat, despite Ghost's silent protests that they knew the wastes very well, thank you, they did  _ not  _ need any mentoring in their properties, especially when  _ he _ had been the one to make them so familiar in the first place.

Her father had responded with a blank stare that rivaled even Hollow's featureless staring, Hollow themselves had followed his lead just behind him, and that was how she ended up squashed in a tiny cave with her legs draped over Hollow's abdomen and her head uncomfortably close to her father's chest, far too awake for her own good, while Ghost propped themselves up against the wall and slept with their head tipped downwards like some sort of supremely haunted voodoo doll. They were the one who had taken the most offense to the tutoring, but they had also been the sibling who benefited the most, and she had seen them soften a bit to their sire when he had asked Hollow to help him with the protection glyphs, correctly catching their tension when they saw the glowing soul motes collect into something far too close to a seal of binding for anyone’s comfort. 

He had called them Silence, then, rather than Hollow. The translation of their void signature was one that he did not often use, too caught up in old habits and preset boundaries to use it often, but this time he had relented. Perhaps he too struggled with casting a spell so close to the ones he had worked on them; she had seen his hands shake when they shuffled over to help him, their soul coalescing with his, but she had chalked it down to effort rather than emotion. It was so easy to forget with him. So easy to forget, when his legacy had been writ in all the children he killed rather than the faint memories of the father he'd barely been to her.

(Silence. Ghost. Thorn. Leaf. All the family-given names of the vessels that had haunted her, the ones who had felt the sting of her needle. All the ones given to her by Ghost, on those cold painful days when she stared down at their hands pressed against hers, and wondered how she could have ever raised her blade against one of her own.)

(Silence. Ghost. Thorn. Leaf. Blade. Whisper. Moss. Shiver Listener Hawthorne Thistle Shadow Fangs Whorl DiggerBlossomGlimmerBreezeLily _AshSandPuddleRockMurmur-_ )

She dug her claws into her palms to ground her, and turned to glare at Ghost, but they were still half-slumped over with their chest rising evenly, looking as dead as the owners of most of the names in her head. The whispering voices in her mind seemed to be all her own, brought to light by their proximity, and her tired nostalgia. Over time, she had grown used to the shades of her siblings watching her from Ghost’s eyes, but that did not seem to be the case here. Ghost was far too attentive when they wanted to visit, far too alert; they certainly wouldn’t be slumped over like that, their growing horns threatening to tip them over, and the endlessly dark shadow that they cast did not blink back at her when she glared at it. 

She scowled at them anyways, more out of principle than vitriol. Were it not for them, she would have stayed behind; she had no idea what her burgeoning divinity would do to her in the future, past what boons it had already granted her in Pharloom, but she did not believe she would ever grow so close to godhood that the lessons taught to her two half-siblings would be relevant. The explanation for the mind-scouring properties of the wastelands was interesting, yes, but she could hardly defend any cities against their effects, much less focus her core power enough to walk through them. 

And she was not so delusional as to think that she could battle a wyrm, like her father warned against. The wastelands were wyrm territory, and she was a keen enough warrior, but the massive creatures that her father had described to them all were far beyond her capabilities. That fell to her siblings, and their ascended status; Hollow had seemed rather uneasy at the prospect of meeting their distant kin, Ghost had only started to look interested around the time their sire had begun to detail the extensive consequences of breaching territorial boundaries, but she had paid no mind to their antics, focusing on watching her father. 

He had been in his element when describing the properties of the world he had once called his home; though reluctant, and beset with two of his children’s hostile stares, he had persevered in giving his lessons, and had proven to be a calm and patient tutor. All the little sighs and avoidant glances from her childhood had been there, but now that she was older, and keener in mind, they had taken on a different tone- not the barely-concealed dislike that she had thought when she was younger, but moments of introspection and exhaustion, when a question proved difficult to answer or uncomfortable to recall. An endless well of patience, offered freely to the children that had managed to survive his trials, against all odds. Patience, and a quiet submission to their anger that did funny things in her chest, choked her up in a way that made her feel like screaming _this is bad, this is wrong, where is your anger, where is the catch, why don’t you just admit you_ ** _hate me_** with every quiet compliment and gentle reassurance he offered, with each question answered or asked. 

But the catch never came. The problems didn’t go away- they never did, not with him, not with the history between them- but he did not snarl, he did not snap. He taught them about the wastelands, as he said he would, and offered small stories when the opportunity arose, and guarded them whenever they decided to take shelter. Even with Ghost stubbornly wedging themselves between him and Hollow, even with her sharp, unforgiving glares, every day, without fail, he would turn his back to the outside world and curl up in front of the little caverns they made their camps in, so any intruders would be met with the painfully bright flare of his wings and the hard, armoured plates running down his back. Using himself as a shield, despite his small stature and weakened form.

At first, she had taken offense- what use was the protection of a fading god against her needle, or the slowly-building power of the Lord of Shades? Even Hollow was a stronger opponent than he was, and they were still stiff from the scars mottling their carapace- but he had insisted, and used every single one of their complaints to refurbish various spells and defensework around their campsites, until there was nothing left to criticize. She did not know whether it was out of a sense of pride or some subtle, misguided means of apologizing, but either way, there was nothing to be done about it. 

And she was still awake, with a full day of expeditions ahead of her, where she could not stop to nap whenever she required it, as she had in the stasis. What a wonderful prospect. 

And yet she still could not sleep.

Caught up in her thoughts, she forgot herself, and tipped her head back to let out a sigh of exhaustion, her forehead smacking solidly against her sire’s chin.

She had misjudged the length of her horns, and the dimensions of the cave. This was a folly. She froze, all too aware of how painful it was for her father to sleep, how awkward it would be to explain herself when he woke up. She hadn’t hit him hard- at least, not hard enough to draw soul- but she knew from experience that getting smacked in the jaw was not something that one usually slept through. 

But he didn’t wake. Unlike the days before the stasis, where rousing him from sleep was often as simple as whispering his name, he did not jolt into consciousness; instead, he let out a soft huff, and tucked his head down so that his jaws brushed lightly against her forehead, as if seeking her out. Then, before she could think of an escape route, his arms appeared from under his blanket and grabbed ahold of her, pulling her into his embrace with a surprising amount of strength. 

Muzzy-headed from a day of travel, instincts conflicted from her past, she could do nothing but freeze for a moment, and that was enough. Carefully, he nestled her against his chest, curling his tail around them both, before sighing again, pressing his chin against her head. His breaths evened out in a moment; not once had his eyes opened, and the usual tug of his mind was absent. He was well and truly asleep, coiled around her as if she was a spiderling again, and she was trapped in his arms, thoughts racing faster than she could process.

When they finally caught up to her again, she had to suppress the urge to jerk away. A veritable lifetime of abandonment had not softened her to the touch of another bug, even with her sibling’s fondness for cuddling, and now, faced with the parental affection that she had been denied for so long, she had no idea what to do with the confusing sensations racing through her mind. The desire to tear herself out of his arms and snarl at him contrasted against the urge to tuck herself up into a little ball and let him hold her tight; she could not remember the last time that he had shown her such affection, only that it had been long before the sealing. Many, many years ago, long enough that her memories blurred into featureless fog lit only by certain sensations- the soft murmur of his voice, the thick, silken robes, how cold he was compared to her mother. The faint edge of his scent, metallic as blood, but with a soft, cool hint to it that had calmed her when she was too little to worry about anything other than where her parents were and how huge the world was, when she was small and weak and didn’t know any better.

All brought back to her now, as he held her tight and hummed quietly to her in his sleep, in a tone almost like a lullaby. One that she knew would lull her into unconsciousness if she let herself stay and listen, the soothing white noise and soft vibration of his voice both familiar and alien, after a lifetime alone struggling with a ruin of his own making. There was comfort here, a soft nostalgia that ached in her chest, urged her to tuck her head under his chin (where it was safe, where she would be safe) and just let him hold her, surrounded by his scent and the slow rise and fall of his breathing. She could sleep like this, she knew, and in the morning he would push himself away and act like nothing ever happened, assuming her to have clung to him instead of Hollow out of some unconscious mistake. 

All at once, it was too much, and she shoved herself away from him, skin prickling from the aftereffects of touch. His eyes flew open, hands instinctively snatching after her cloak, before he rolled over onto his stomach and stared at her, his glow going up as he came into full awareness of his surroundings. It was a sharp, harsh light compared to the dark of the cave, and she reflexively hissed at it; Hollow shifted as well, a slight movement of their mask paired with a deep, whistling exhale, and he snapped around to stare at them, wild-eyed, before dimming his light to a barely-there glow, one that didn’t sting her eyes everytime she so much as glanced near him. 

Which meant that she really had no excuse to avoid looking at him, especially since he was silently staring at her, waiting for her to speak. She rubbed her palms against each other (nervously? For what reason did she have to be nervous? It was he who grabbed her, his fault that they were currently facing off like this), before breathing in deep and looking him in the eyes, forcing herself to not look away. 

“Do not touch me.”

Her eyes blinked back at her from a face not quite her own, the proof of his blood mirrored through their features, and she had to remind herself to stand her ground, to not cower away like the spiderling in her mind wished her to. She was no longer a child, and certainly not his to covet. He may not have tried to harm her, like the rest of her siblings, but that did not mean that he didn’t discard her in an entirely different manner. Her egg did not need to be cast into the void sea to stain her carapace with his regrets, and she was not so much of a fool to think that that did not affect the way that he saw her, his bastard daughter born out of bargain instead of love. A testament to his desperation, his  _ failure _ , wrought in flesh. “You’re not sleeping.”

His retort was thick-tongued and clumsy, unfitting of an ex-king, and she let out an ugly snort in reply. Let neither of them have any grace in this barren land of unblooded gods, where there was nothing left of the Pale King to use as an excuse, only the Pale Wyrm seeking amendment for his sins. Well, she was not like any of her siblings, the gods of the Abyss and all that it represented. She did not accept his regrets as payment for the fine of her forgiveness, and she would not offer him any kindness if he tried to act like the father he never was to her. A hug and a few dozen empty apologies did not make up for years of loneliness and loss, centuries of watching the world she was born to protect slowly crumble around her. “Don’t act like you truly care about my sleeping habits. That’s none of your concern- the more pressing manner is that you grabbed me in your sleep. Pray that you do not make such a mistake again.”

He did not offer any emotion in the blank stare that he gave her in reply, but she saw the way that his foreclaws gouged into the earth, kneading little furrows into the hard, rocky ground, as he often did when he was too busy thinking to speak. She knew what that meant, and so she folded her arms and waited impatiently for his rebuttal; sure enough, it wasn’t long before he hesitated, and then whispered, “we have a long day of travel ahead of us, and are too far out from Hallownest to call for aid. Sleep.”

“That was the intent,” she said dryly, “before you grabbed me. This would not be a problem if you had kept your distance.”

“You were likely within touching distance. I can hardly be blamed for the instinct to care for one of my own; it is wrought into me, and I cannot quell it when unconscious. I do not intend to coddle you if it is not what you wish from me, but save your accusations for mistakes I make consciously, not when I am wandering through the hallways of my memories and thus pay no heed to the state of my physical form.” He nearly growled the words at her, before he sighed and pulled his claws from the earth, absentmindedly rubbing the dirt off his pure white shell. She glared at him, tapping her claws against her arms, and he hesitated again, before quietly stating, “Your siblings would not want to see you exhausted.”

“Do not presume to know what my siblings would want,” she snapped, harsher than she intended- she saw the way that Hollow shifted out of the corner of her eye, the way that their shoulders tensed, and knew that she had roused them. They would not intervene just yet, they would give her a chance to make amends, but the knowledge of their unease displeased her. They always hated it when she fought with their father, but her heart was pounding hard enough for her jaws to ache with the thrum of it, and anger pulsed with every heartbeat. “You cannot presume to know what my siblings would want, after spending so many years in willful ignorance, after  _ discarding _ them for the simple desire to live, after damning  _ me _ to kill the ones you failed to destroy because you were too busy feeling  _ sorry for yourself  _ to clean up after your failures-”

“Do you think that I don’t know that?” He did not hiss at her. Somehow, for some reason, that was worse. She saw Hollow’s breathing stop, a faint tremble starting up in their horns, and felt something turn over in her stomach with a sickening lurch. “I do. I think of it with every waking moment. The expanse of the devastation I wrought is so extreme that even I fail to truly understand it, and it weighs on me with every breath I take.” 

He drew back from her, clutching at the sleeves of his robes. His blanket fell off of him, pooling around his tail, and it made him seem even smaller than he really was, tucked up and hunched over as if he were in pain. When did he start to seem so small to her? She had always viewed him as something larger than life, something much more than his physical form, and this...realization dawning on her somehow felt much worse than the one before, when she realized that she could fall asleep in his arms, as if nothing had ever happened between them. “I know that...I am aware that I am irredeemable. I know that I was wrong. But I speak only the truth in this regard, for it is impossible to assume otherwise. Your siblings care very deeply for you, and they would not want to see you exhausted, for whatever reason it may be.” 

Anger sank its claws into her- how  _ dare _ he use their feelings as something to control her, after so many of them died for showing the same kind of affection- before she sighed and tore herself free of its grasp. That was then, and this was now, and her being angry for something that pained him so deeply was merely driving salt into the wound. Perhaps the exhaustion was getting to her, and she was being irrational; she’d gain nothing from this.

Still, the urge to strike back rose within her, brought to light by her exhaustion and the bitterness between them. She opened her mouth to snarl something back at him- what it was, she could not say- before, with a soft huff, Hollow rose from their resting place, bumping her aside as they propped themselves up on their elbow. When they looked between the two of them, their face was as blank as ever, but it did not take a genius to see how unhappy they were with all the fighting, a disappointed silence pressing down upon her as they stared deep into her eyes, wordlessly asking her to stand down. 

Her bitterness fled, leaving only guilt behind, the flame of her anger dwindling to cold ashes in her chest. She stared back at them, rendered mute by their disappointment, and they took that opportunity to hook their leg around her abdomen and push her away from the Pale Wyrm, to where Ghost still slumbered, blissfully unaware of the fighting. 

She allowed them to move her, not wanting their ire to extend into the next day, and flinched as Ghost’s ice-cold claws settled on her arm, patting blindly about before pulling her close and snuggling against her, sapping some of her heat before she shoved the blanket between them, retrieving her arm in the process. And then she watched out of the corner of her eyes as Hollow timidly, hesitantly nudged the point of their mask against their father’s chest, taking the spot that she had pulled herself away from. Asking for his affection, as they never would so many years ago, when all that they were was hidden behind a title that never fit them and a responsibility that would nearly kill them. When they were expected to be the Pure Vessel, not a child longing for their parent’s attention and affection, misguided though the desire may be.

He blinked at them, coming out of the daze that the fight had put him in (and how easily he was losing himself now, slipping into the murk and mire of his thoughts when there was no one around to catch him). Slowly, he brought one of his hands to their mask, pressing it against their cheek- and then he sighed, and laid back down on his side, pulling their face down with him so that he could try to tuck them under his jaw, like he had with her. It was an awkward fit- Hollow was far too big to be cuddled in such a manner, and the Pale Wyrm’s movements were stilted by a blatant lack of experience, but as Hornet watched her older sibling tuck their limbs in close and tremble, leaning into the contact, something dark and full of regrets dislodged itself from her throat. 

“Sorry,” she muttered- for Hollow’s benefit more than hers, though she wasn’t entirely sure if her shame was just from upsetting them. She would never forgive him, she could never manage to do such a thing, but for all the horrors he had inflicted upon the world, he was still her father and she was  _ tired.  _ "I shouldn't have been so harsh."

Another quiet sigh from her sire. His light dimmed down to something barely there as he laid his head against his pillow, fading until it was nothing more than a soft glow blurring the edges of his form. For Hollow's benefit, no doubt; he knew how ruined the Old Light had left them, and was astoundingly careful around them, even though she knew that his light didn't hurt them as much anymore. With the true might of the King's Brand transferred to Ghost, and the power of the void stronger than it had been since before the time of the Old Light, that harsh, enthralling quality was no longer present. Already, her sibling was drifting off to sleep, their trembling easing as they relaxed into the Pale Wyrm’s hold; he did not need to dim his natural light so much, and she knew that he knew they were okay. 

And yet he still attempted to accommodate their needs. Guilt stabbed her, slipping past her sleep-downed defenses, though her heart hardened a bit when he spoke again. It was practically instinct by now, to need to anticipate whatever trickery may be hidden within his words. "You hardly need to apologize for setting boundaries."

"That's not what I was apologizing for," she muttered, laying her head against Ghost's blanket-enveloped form. Though they had molted a few times in the time she was away, their shell was still soft, and they made a very receptive pillow as she pressed her cheek against them, shuffling around so they could lean against her horn. The weight of them was surprisingly solid and remarkably soothing, even after she'd had ample time to grow used to their touch. And the cold of them lulled her, a song of the abyss that was as alien to her as the howling wind of the wild wastelands, but gentler, kinder. She was not one of them, but she was of their kin, and that was enough. "I hit your chin with my head."

Another sigh from where her father was, slightly muffled by Hollow pressing up against his throat. She was fairly certain they were fully asleep by now, exhausted from a day of hiking when their body was still so ruined. Centuries of neglect were not so easily reversed.

"We can talk about it in the morning," murmured the Pale Wyrm- he too was dropping off into sleep, evident by the low crackle suffusing his voice. This, too, lulled her deep, but as her eyelids drooped and her thoughts cast adrift, she could not find it in herself to care. "We have bickered about it enough. But for now, rest."

His voice was low and soothing, she was tired from a stressful day and a stressful night, and Ghost was soft and squishy. She might have made a sound then, a sleepy little affirmative  _ mrr,  _ but by then her mind had freed itself of its shackles, and she drifted off before she could hear her sire's last whisper.

"And may your dreams wander well.”

* * *

And if they all slept in longer than they expected to, well- there was the sandstorm outside to blame, and breakfast time and seal-breaking to attend to once it was over, and the topic of their collective sleepiness was not brought to light until they were already trudging through the endless expanse of the wasteland, when there was no longer any sign of their scuffle other than some scratch marks in a little mountain nook already half-lost to the wild lands beyond.

The centuries between them didn’t seem so daunting anymore. Not when there was prey to catch and spells to cast, not when Ghost learned how to use the shadows in the cliffs to teleport around and spent the entire day pranking them when they least expected it. Not when Hornet caught the exasperation in her sire’s face when a prank went awry and Hollow headbutted them horns-over-heels into the sands, a perfect mirror of her own. Not when she watched him take down a beetle and show Ghost how to do the same, when she watched Hollow coax the wasteland flowers to full bloom and rested against their knee while he praised them, the cool shadows below their cloak a welcome respite. Not when the horizon shifted and writhed, and his head went up and he ushered them into the safety of the mountains, where he quietly told them about how his kind interacted and survived while the wyrm miles away slowly tunneled its way through the sands, the earth rearranging to its whims. 

Slowly, but surely, they were learning. 

Slowly, but surely, they were healing.

And for her, at least, that was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> I should mention that Hornet is very much NOT OKAY with pretty much fucking everything PK did, but she's starting to come to terms with the fact that he is at least TRYING to fix what he's done, and that's what she's fine with. There's no way that he can be forgiven, but that doesn't mean that he can't try. 
> 
> Esp. if Hollow's there to keep everyone in check; they've had ample time to stop making his affection the thing their entire world revolves around, but it's nice to get some affirmation that he loved them, yaknow. And if Hollow's happy, then everyone's happy


End file.
